


Time Will Come

by pennilesspoet



Series: Snap Verse [1]
Category: Schitt's Creek
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Supernatural Elements, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Spoilers, M/M, No Actual Avengers Appear, POV David Rose, Post-Canon, Temporary Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-26
Updated: 2020-09-26
Packaged: 2021-03-07 18:33:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,107
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26642257
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pennilesspoet/pseuds/pennilesspoet
Summary: It's been five years since the incident that changed the world. David wakes to find a stranger running his store, and his husband sleeping with somebody else.
Relationships: Patrick Brewer/David Rose, Patrick Brewer/Original Male Character(s)
Series: Snap Verse [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1939390
Comments: 52
Kudos: 157





	Time Will Come

**Author's Note:**

> This story has very little to do with the MCU, in that there are no characters from those movies appearing. 
> 
> You don't really need to have seen the MCU (Avengers) movies to read this, I don't think. But essentially, (spoilers) a bunch of people vanished because of a bad guy, then five years later, the Avengers were able to fix it, and all the people came back.
> 
> In short, I finally got around to watching the last few MCU movies, and after I watched Endgame, I couldn't help but wonder how the non superhero-type people were handling the sudden disappearance of their loved ones, only to have them reappear five years down the line.

Consciousness comes to him suddenly.

He opens his eyes, and is shocked to see the sky above him. Why is he outside? It’s then he realizes that he is on the soft, damp grass in their backyard. Why is he laying on the ground? Especially in this sweater!

The last thing he remembers is standing on this very lawn, facing his husband, who was teasing him about...something. He’d watched Patrick’s expression, bright and cheeky, morph into a look of fear and devastation. And then...nothing.

It seems strange to him that Patrick would have left him out here like this. Maybe he ran inside to call for an ambulance? David still isn’t sure what happened to him. It just feels like one moment he was here, and the next - gone.

He sits up slowly, cautious of a potential head injury. But aside from general confusion and a feeling that something isn’t quite right, he feels...fine. Nothing hurts. He rises to his feet, and runs his hands down the arms of his sweater and jeans, in an attempt to dust away lingering dirt.

“Patrick?” he calls out. Silence greets him. Sighing, he makes his way across the yard and into the house.

The first thing he notices is the color of the cabinets. Dark blue, in contrast to the bright white quartz countertops. Modern brass hardware. Patterned backsplash. This is an almost exact replica of David’s sketches. But they were saving up for the kitchen reno. It was months down the line. Patrick was prioritizing David’s new closet. 

His dream kitchen is here, in front of him, and David has never felt so unsettled to see one of his visions come to fruition.

Confusion burns through him and he tries to make sense of what he is seeing. Maybe he did hit his head? Swallowing thickly, he moves down the hallway, taking in the subtle but sudden changes inside his home. The floors are the same, but they look older, more worn in. There is a different throw on the sofa. There is a god-awful yellow accent pillow on his reading chair. Small, but noticeable changes - choices he would have never made - surround him. But there’s something else. Something nagging at him. He scans the living space again.

There are no photos.

His eyes scan the wall where his and Patrick’s wedding photos used to reside. They were black and white photos, with white mattes and solid black frames. There were eight of them. David carefully dusts them every Sunday.

In place of the photos is a crisp paper map. It’s pinned to the wall with thumbtacks, which is _incorrect_ in every way. The map is covered with small pins and sticky notes. Patrick’s precise, neat handwriting is on the notes. David approaches the map, and sees his own name almost immediately. He scans the other notes. Bob. Jocelyn. Ray. Why are all of their names on here? His eyes scan the rest of the map, and he sees another set of notes. Moira Rose. Clint and Marcy Brewer. Zachary Harrison. He doesn’t recognize that name, or any of the others below it.

He feels like a stranger in his own home. What is going on? He forces down his panic, and makes his way to the stairs. Perhaps there are more clues in their bedroom. As he ascends the stairs, he revisits his final memory before waking up a few minutes earlier. He recalls Patrick’s face. He’d looked so panicked. So upset. David tries to focus more inward. What was _he_ feeling at the time? He felt like he was...fading away. Is he dead? Did he die? Is he haunting their cottage? He pauses in the hallway and places his hand against the wall. No. Not a ghost. So then what is happening to him?

He makes his way down the hallway, and to their bedroom. He needs to talk to his husband. 

The door opens with a whisper. David can tell, from the way the light hits the room, that it is early morning. But his last memory was in the afternoon. Had Patrick really left him outside overnight? His gaze lands on the bed, and his heart stops. He thinks he makes a noise, but all he can hear is a ringing in his ears.

Patrick is asleep in their bed. A man he’s never seen before is asleep next to him.

“What-” David hears himself gasp as his back hits the bedroom door. Patrick sits up suddenly, as does the stranger. David watches his husband’s face as he realizes David is there, but he feels like he’s watching the world from outside of his body. His chest hurts. Is this what it feels like when your heart is breaking?

Patrick’s face has paled considerably, and his eyes are wide and shining with tears. 

“D-David??” he rasps. The stranger has slipped out of bed and is sliding on underwear and sweatpants.

“What the _fuck_ is going on!?” David screeches at the stranger, because he cannot look at Patrick right now. 

“Oh my god, David-” Patrick tries to detangle himself from the bed clothes as he rises, but he falls onto the floor instead. He curses as he stands, stark naked and trembling.

“David. How - You’re. You’re here,” Patrick seems almost afraid of David. It’s disconcerting and bizarre. Patrick’s phone starts buzzing on his nightstand. Patrick ignores it, and the vibrations send it tumbling to the floor. Patrick takes a staggering step toward David. The stranger is still standing on David’s side of the bed, his bright blue eyes as wide and shocked as Patrick’s.

“No. No, this is. Stay the _fuck_ away from me,” David shakes his head and backs out of the room. He can hear Patrick calling after him as he stumbles down the stairs, and out the front door. He pauses to try and catch his breath. There are two unfamiliar cars in his driveway. There is an unfamiliar man in his marital bed. David bends over and throws up on Patrick’s begonias. No. They’re roses now. He hears movement inside the house. He can’t face Patrick and this stranger again. He rushes out of the yard, and down the street toward town. He can hear Patrick calling out for him, his voice rough with tears.

**~~@~~**

The motel looks the same.

David crosses the dirt parking lot, the familiarity a welcome reprieve from the house he’s just fled from. 

He’d realized on his way over that he doesn’t have his phone. He wants to call Stevie to see if she’s in town - she is on the road more than she is in Schitt’s Creek these days.

Or is she? Has that changed too? David wonders if he has landed in some kind of upside down universe. 

He opens the door to the motel office, and a young, blue-haired teenager is seated behind the desk. They look up at David as he enters, and offers David a customer service smile.

“Checking in?”

“Uh, no. Not...not yet. Is Stevie here?”

“Oh. No, she’s not due to be here until this afternoon. Can I take a message for her, or-”

“No, I - can you call her? I-I don’t have my phone, and it’s sort of an emergency.”

“Uh, okay. Um, can I tell her who is asking after her?”

“David. Rose. David Rose.”

The teenager’s eyes widen, and they fumble to pick up their phone. 

“Stevie? It’s Jaden. Um. _David Rose_ is in the office. No, just him.” Jaden nods a couple of times as Stevie replies, then rasps out an “Okay,” before hanging up.

“She’s on her way. She said not to go anywhere.”

“Right,” David sighs. He’s suddenly completely exhausted. The events of this morning are dancing in his head, taunting him. He collapses on the blue mid-century modern sofa that sits across the room from the check in desk. It’s more aesthetically pleasing than the monstrosity that used to sit in this office, but it is also wildly uncomfortable.

He must have dozed off a little, because suddenly a door is slamming, and Stevie is standing in front of him, shaking and crying like nothing he has ever seen.

“Oh my god, _David_ ,” she gasps as she throws herself at him. 

“ _Oof_. Jesus, Stevie,” David says without any real heat. He’s so goddamn thankful to see her right now.

“How are you here?” she asks.

“I walked from my house. Or-I don’t know if it is my house anymore,” David whispers.

“Did you talk to Patrick? Where is he? Is he okay?”

“Is _he_ okay? Stevie, I woke up _in the dirt_ , and went into my house to find my husband in our bed with someone else. _Naked._ I frankly don’t give a shit how Patrick is doing right now,” David huffs, but even as he says it, he knows that’s not true. Patrick had looked completely wrecked this morning. 

“That’s Ben,” Stevie bites her lip, “Listen, it’s not my place to tell you about that, but David - do you know what year it is?”

“Oh are you kidding me? We’re doing the _amnesia_ thing?” David hisses.

“Not amnesia. David. You-you’ve been _gone_. You’ve been gone for five years.”

David feels the blood rush out of his head. That’s ridiculous. Where has he been for _five years_? And why can’t he remember anything? If it’s not amnesia, then what is it?

But that would explain why the kitchen was changed. Why the house looked so strange. Why Patrick was sleeping next to someone new.

Five years.

“I don’t understand,” David whispers. He can feel tears pooling in his eyes.

“It wasn’t just you. It was almost half the town. It was your mom. Both of Patrick’s parents. Gone, in the blink of an eye. Patrick saw you vanish. He said it was like you turned to ash. A lot of people, including Patrick, still held out hope that they could get you back. Word came out that it was a guy - an alien. He used some sort of sorcery. The Avengers tried to stop him, but they failed.”

“But I guess Patrick was right; there was a way to bring you all back.”

“If he was trying to get me back, why did he marry someone else?” David is trying to hold onto his anger, so that he won’t have to face the myriad of other emotions clamoring for dominance in his head. It’s almost unbelievable what Stevie is telling him.

“David, Patrick was - look, we were all devastated. The world just seemed to go dark, and so quiet. Patrick tried hard to focus on learning _how_ it all happened. He clung to the hope that it could be reversed so that he wouldn’t have to face reality. But after almost two years, he just - uh. He hadn’t really dealt with losing both you _and_ his parents, and it caught up to him. Ugh, I’ve already said too much. You need to talk to Patrick.”

David swallows, feeling nauseated. Stevie’s matter-of-fact description of what they all went through - what _Patrick_ went through - is undoubtedly lacking in detail, but David isn’t sure he wants to know what happened, or how Patrick met Ben, or when he decided to let David go. 

“Can I just stay here for a while?”

Stevie looks disappointed, but nods sharply. They stand, and Jaden is suddenly right there, a familiar-looking room key in their hand. David takes the key, and turns the plastic keychain over in his palm. 

“Room 7. Really?”

“It’s the only one available,” Stevie shrugs and leads him out of the office.

**~~@~~**

“He redid the kitchen.” David is laying on the bed, staring at the ceiling in his parent’s old motel room. The tiles have been replaced, but David can picture precisely where the water damage was located.

“Yeah. About a year and a half ago? He came across your sketchbook and called Ronnie.”

“And Ronnie helped him? Voluntarily?” David raises his head to look over at Stevie, who is pacing in front of the kitchenette, typing on her phone. At David’s question, she lowers her phone to glare at him.

“David. I. I don’t know how to explain to you how it’s been here.” Her expression softens and she lets out a deep sigh. “The petty differences just...kind of stopped mattering for a while. Also, uh. I think she likes Ben.”

David drops his head back onto the pillow with a huff at mention of Patrick’s new husband. 

“We should call your dad. He and Alexis are about to get onto a plane to California, and they’re going to be out of pocket for a while.”

David sits up at that. God, he hadn’t even thought about his family, he was so caught up in his own shit. “There’s a map on Patrick’s wall. It had my mom’s name on it. She disappeared too?”

“Yes. She reappeared this morning just like you did. But there are other people living in that house now, and they were understandably shocked to find Moira Rose in their living room.”

“My dad - “ David knows that his dad would have been devastated to lose his mom like that. 

“Alexis has been looking after him. He was - not well, for a long time. When he found out that your mom reappeared, he insisted on flying out to California to meet her and bring her back.” Stevie hits a button then, no doubt calling David’s family. She holds out her phone just as Alexis’s face appears on screen. David gingerly takes the phone from Stevie’s outstretched hand.

“David!” Alexis exclaims, and then begins to sob.

“Alexis, it’s okay-” 

“You’re really back. Oh my god,” Alexis cries. In the background, he can hear his dad asking after him. The phone pivots, and then his dad’s face fills the screen.

He looks so much older. Haggard, in a way he never had before, even in those early days here in Schitt’s Creek. David feels more tendrils of guilt course through him.

“David. It’s so good to see you, son.”

“Hi Dad,” David rasps. Tears are streaking down his face, and he swipes at them with the back of his hand.

“We’re going to get your mother. And then we’re going to come over to see you and Patrick,” Johnny says matter-of-factly. David can see tears in his eyes as he speaks.

“That - that would be great,” David replies after a long pause. The phone swings around again and Alexis is back on screen. Now that the shock of seeing her has worn off, he can see that her hair is darker than it was before. She, too, looks markedly older. It’s incredibly hard to see the toll that all of this has taken on those who were left behind.

“We’ll see you in a couple of days, David.”

“Okay,” David nods at his sister.

“I love you, David,” Alexis blinks back her own tears, and the call ends before he can form a reply.

**~~@~~**

From his vantage point across the street, Rose Apothecary looks the same. 

But as he approaches, he can see that the signage on the windows is faded and chipped, and the fruit and vegetable bins are gone. 

Stevie had offered to accompany him to see the store, but he wants - he needs - to do this himself. Stevie has been fielding texts and calls all afternoon. She is apparently on the Town Council now, and has been helping to deal with the fallout that comes with half of the town’s residents suddenly reappearing. It’s bad enough that he’s feeling overwhelming guilt and responsibility for this chaos; he doesn’t want to hold her up from doing her work. So she’d walked with him into town, and then headed over to Town Hall while he continued to the Apothecary.

He stands just outside the store now, staring in. The store looks wholly unfamiliar. The furniture and shelving is all the same, but the products that line the shelves are not beautiful or uniform. They are practical and utilitarian; much more like the products that graced the dusty shelves of the Apothecary’s unfortunate predecessor. Taking a deep breath, David opens the door and steps inside. A song he’s never heard before is playing softly on the speaker system. A woman he’s never met is standing behind the counter.

“Let me know if you need any help,” the woman says without preamble. She is plain looking and rail thin, with a piercing in her nose and a dress that looks like it used to be curtains. Nothing about this space is familiar or welcoming, and David hates everything about what his store has become. In his mind, he was just here yesterday. He was standing in the far corner, stocking new jars of their popular lavender and chamomile hand cream. 

_The cream is one of their best sellers. David straightens the precise stack of squat glass containers, a small smile on his face. He starts when he feels Patrick’s hands slide around his waist._

_“I thought you were heading straight home after your meeting?” David asks, even as he leans back into Patrick’s warm chest._

_“Mmm, missed you too much,” Patrick says into his shoulder._

_“You just saw me three hours ago!”_

_Patrick places his sturdy hands on David’s hips and guides him to turn to face him before wrapping his arms back around his waist._

_“Are you complaining?” Patrick asks, eyes alight and voice teasing, “I can go, if you need more space…”_

_“Mmm, no, I think you can stay right where you are,” David smirks. Patrick leans up to kiss him softly._

The sound of the cash register drawer sliding shut breaks the reverie. David’s eyes land in the corner where the beautiful hand creams and hand-made soaps once sat, replaced now by boxes of batteries and large black and yellow flashlights.

Behind him, the bell over the door jingles, and David spins around to see Patrick in the doorway, wearing the same clothes that he’d worn five years ago, but with an expression wholly unfamiliar.

“David.”

“What did you do to my store?” David asks before he can stop himself.

Patrick winces, before stepping forward and slamming the door behind him. 

“Our store. And it was necessary.” Patrick looks exhausted. His eyes are bloodshot and his jaw is clenched. After a beat of uncomfortable silence, he looks over at the woman behind the counter. She is looking between the two of them, her eyes wide.

“Meredith, I can close up if you want to take off,” Patrick says, but his tone leaves little room for negotiation. David looks over at Meredith, but she doesn’t seem fazed by Patrick’s clipped words. She simply shrugs and slips behind the curtain of their store room. She emerges a minute later with her bag, and leaves with only a brief glance at Patrick, who nods silently. Once she is gone, Patrick looks back over at David.

“I know you must be confused, and upset. Stevie told me that she explained about The Snap.”

“The Snap?”

“That’s what they called it, when it happened. The thing that snapped everyone out of existence,” Patrick replies with a frown. He looks back at David, and his expression softens.

“I...I’m sorry about this morning. I know that must have been-”

“Surprising, yes,” David nods. He gazes at Patrick, who is still standing across the room from him, his hands curled into tight fists at his sides. His soft brown eyes are framed with more lines than David remembers, and his hair is longer. Soft curls are sitting on top of his head, dark brown and auburn and grey. For David, the snap lasted moments; but standing here, in front of the love of his life, he feels the years between them. It hurts to know that they will never get that time back. That they may have run out of time altogether. The silence surrounds them, and David doesn’t know what to do next. He longs to hold Patrick, to take away the pain he can see etched on his face, but he doesn’t know his place here anymore. Patrick runs a hand over his own face, and that’s when David sees it. 

“You’re wearing the ring I gave you.” The ring on Patrick’s hand is the one David put there months ago - no, _years_ ago.

Patrick looks at him, confused, then glances down at his own hand.

“Yes, I am,” Patrick replies somberly.

“But. Aren’t you married to Ben?”

“No,” Patrick shakes his head. He sighs and leans heavily against the counter next to him.

“We - we never made it official. He moved in about a year ago. But. I don’t know, it never felt right, to go through with it.”

“How did you meet him?” David asks tentatively. He’s not sure he wants to know about Ben, and yet he longs to understand more about the time he’s lost.

“We, uh. We met at a support group in Elmdale,” Patrick shrugs and looks at his shoes. He rubs the back of his neck with his right hand, while the left tightly grips the counter behind him.

“It was a group for people who had lost their spouses. Mostly just people telling stories about the person they lost. Ben, he - he lost his husband, Zachary, and the way he described their relationship, it reminded me so much of us. We started meeting before the sessions to have coffee, and then sometimes we’d grab dinner afterward, and then one night we just. It just happened. It was another way to cope.”

David can understand that. He honestly isn’t sure how he would have managed if their roles had been reversed. He knows that he would have been very lost without Patrick. Still, there is one thing nagging at David. One more thing he needs to know.

“Do you love him?” He asks it quickly and quietly, as though the impact of the words might hit differently that way. Patrick looks up at him then, his eyes wet with tears.

“Of course I love him. But it’s - it’s not the same.”

“I understand,” David says with a smile he doesn’t feel, “It’s been five years, and-”

“David,” Patrick steps forward then, and places his hand, warm and calloused, on David’s.

“We were keeping each other alive. We - we both lost the loves of our lives, and we just needed someone to hold onto. I need you to understand that.”

David gazes down at the place where their hands meet. He feels warm for the first time since he woke this morning, disoriented and alone.

“Can I kiss you?” he looks up as he says it, and he’s glad he did. He gets to watch Patrick’s face morph into a smile he has fiercely missed.

“I wish you would,” Patrick whispers. David lets out a breath and takes Patrick’s face in his hands.

This kiss sends a jolt through him, the way it did that first night in the motel parking lot. The way it did on a sunny afternoon on top of a mountain. The way it did the day they said ‘I do’. The way it always does.

Patrick’s lips are soft and warm, and he smells like home. David wraps his arms around Patrick’s shoulders. Patrick pulls away and buries his face in David’s chest. The stand there, holding each other, the fading light of the day shining through the windows of the store that they built together. Slowly, reluctantly, they pull apart. Patrick’s eyes are heavy, and his cheek is red where it was pressed against David’s chest. He’s stunning, even in his sadness. 

It’s then that something occurs to David. He takes Patrick’s hand in his, and runs a thumb over his knuckle.

“Did. Um. Did Ben’s husband come back too?” David asks softly.

“Yes. He’s in Elm Glen. After um. After things settled down a little bit this morning, Ben left to find him.”

“Are you. Are you okay?” David asks hesitantly. Patrick nods, his eyes on their joined hands.

“Yeah. Ben and I are going to have to - well, we’ll work it out,” Patrick looks up then, determination in his soft brown eyes. “You’re the only one I want, David.”

David smiles, and pulls Patrick toward him. He knows that there is a lot that they have to talk about. He knows that none of this is going to be easy, for any of them. But he wants, more than anything, to have his life back. 

“David. Will you come home?”

There isn’t any place he’d rather be.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Please let me know what you think!
> 
> I'm building this as a little series, so that I can write stand alone stories about life for the characters of SC post-snap. But let me know if you're interested in reading something from Patrick's POV. It would be uh, hella angsty probs.


End file.
